The present invention relates to a method and a device for stowing and handling modular-type propellant charges in artillery guns with fully or semi-automatic loading systems.
It is already possible using artillery locating radar and other surveillance systems, for example, to determine rapidly and with high precision the location of an artillery gun that has opened fire. There is thus a good opportunity for an enemy to open effective counter-battery fire. The artillery has therefore more or less been forced to depart from its previously fairly stationary tactics in favor of significantly more mobile tactics involving rapid engagements in the form of short intensive fires followed by immediate redeployment to a pre-determined deployment site at a sufficiently safe distance from the previous one. These new tactics have resulted in an increased need for every gun to be self-propelled and capable of carrying at least a primary requirement of ammunition.
One must also assume that coming generations of artillery will use modular-type propellant charges that is, propellant charges consisting of a number of modular charges of different sizes, such as length and, to a certain extent, diameter, and of different charge strength with primarily rigid combustible outer casings, and that are combinable in various ways to provide the desired muzzle velocities. At present, this system of modular charges is called M(A)CS, that is, Modular (Artillery) Charge System. Moreover, the next generation of artillery guns is expected to be equipped with armored protection against battlefield fragments to an even greater extent than is normal today. Next generation loading systems will be required to operate very rapidly and be capable of stowing large quantities of propellant charges and of handling all the different types of propellant charges in the M(A)CS. The propellant charges must also be stowable in the least possible space. In addition, loading systems shall be robust and durable. Also, the propellant charge magazine shall be replenishable in a very short time, preferably from a vehicle equipped with an automatic resupply unit.
A purpose of the present invention is to offer a propellant charge handling system that meets the above stated requirements.
The present invention is based, at least in part, on the use of a very compact stowage space in which the modular charges are stowed linearly in a number of magazine tubes arranged parallel to each other. Each magazine tube contains a single type of modular charges. Each such magazine tube terminates in a common endplane, while the opposite end of each magazine tube is accessible for an ejector provisionally built into the tube. Even ejectors operated by compressed air ought to be usable.
In combination with this magazine, a manipulator is used that can be described as an industrial robot with limited operating motion arranged to maneuver a retrieval tube between the outfeed apertures of the magazine tubes. The retrieval tube is thus aligned with a magazine tube after which a desired number of modular charges are transferred to the retrieval tube. This arrangement can thus retrieve modular charges from a number of different magazine tubes and, thereby, assemble a complete propellant charge of the desired charge strength before it is maneuvered to an outer end position aligned with the loading pendulum used to load the artillery gun in question and to which the complete charge is transferred by, for example, an ejector built into the retrieval tube. The latter can also be used to determine the number of modular charges to be retrieved from a specific magazine tube.
One variant of the present invention can include two identically designed compact magazines and arrange a retrieval tube in a space between them. This arrangement enables this variant to retrieve modular charges from both its ends. In this variant, the retrieval tube should also be usable for transferring modular charges to the loading pendulum, or be usable itself as a loading pendulum for loading the gun. However, in this variant, the ejector must be specially designed so that it is not in the way when replenishing with modular charges via the rear aperture of the retrieval tube.
Still other objects and advantages of the present invention will become readily apparent by those skilled in the art from the following detailed description, wherein it is shown and described only the preferred embodiments of the invention, simply by way of illustration of the best mode contemplated of carrying out the invention. As will be realized, the invention is capable of other and different embodiments, and its several details are capable of modifications in various obvious respects, without departing from the invention. Accordingly, the drawings and description are to be regarded as illustrative in nature and not as restrictive.